Barry Hess

The 2022 Arizona gubernatorial election occurred on November 8, 2022, to elect the next governor of Arizona concurrently with other federal and state elections. Incumbent Republican governor Doug Ducey was term-limited and ineligible to run for a third consecutive term. Democratic Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs won the election, defeating Republican former television anchor Kari Lake. This race was one of six Republican-held governorships up for election in 2022 taking place in a state that was carried by Democrat Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election.

Primaries were held on August 2, with Lake winning the Republican nomination and Hobbs winning the Democratic nomination, making this the first gubernatorial election in Arizona history in which both major party candidates for governor are women. Hobbs is set to become the fifth female governor of Arizona, with Arizona setting a record for the most female governors in American history. With the concurrent passage of Proposition 131, this will be the last gubernatorial election in Arizona without a lieutenant governor on the ticket.

Hobbs defeated Lake, becoming the first Democrat to win a gubernatorial election in the state since 2006. This was the closest gubernatorial election in the 2022 election cycle.

Republican primary

Candidates

Nominee

*Kari Lake, former KSAZ-TV news anchor

Eliminated in primary

*Scott Neely, businessman
* Karrin Taylor Robson, land developer and member of the Arizona Board of Regents
*Paola Tulliani-Zen, businesswoman

Withdrew

*Steve Gaynor, businessman and nominee for Arizona Secretary of State in 2018
*Matt Salmon, former U.S. Representative for and nominee for governor in 2002 ''(endorsed Robson)''
*Kimberly Yee, Arizona State Treasurer ''( running for re-election)''

Declined

*Kirk Adams, former Chief of Staff to Governor Doug Ducey and former Speaker of the Arizona House of Representatives
*Andy Biggs, U.S. Representative for ''(endorsed Salmon)''
*Mark Brnovich, Arizona Attorney General ''( ran for the U.S. Senate)''
*Steve Chucri, Maricopa County supervisor

*David Schweikert, U.S. Representative for ''(endorsed Salmon)''
*Kelli Ward, chair of the Arizona Republican Party, former state senator and candidate for the U.S. Senate in 2016 and 2018

Endorsements

Polling

;Aggregate polls

;Graphical summary

;Karrin Taylor Robson vs. Matt Salmon

Results

Democratic primary

Candidates

Nominee

* Katie Hobbs, Arizona Secretary of State

Eliminated in primary

* Marco López Jr., former Chief of Staff for the U.S. Customs and Border Protection and former Mayor of Nogales

Withdrawn

* Aaron Lieberman, former state representative for the 28th district

Declined

*Charlene Fernandez, Minority Leader of the Arizona House of Representatives
*Kate Gallego, Mayor of Phoenix
*Ruben Gallego, U.S. Representative for ''( running for re-election)''
*Tom O'Halleran, U.S. Representative for ''( running for re-election)''
*Greg Stanton, U.S. Representative for and former Mayor of Phoenix ''( running for re-election)''

Endorsements

Polling

;Graphical summary

Results

Libertarian primary

Candidates

Eliminated in primary

* Barry Hess, perennial candidate

Results

Write-in candidate Barry Hess was unopposed in the Libertarian primary, but failed to secure the minimum number of votes to receive the nomination.

Certified write-in candidates

*Anthony Camboni (independent)
*Steph Denny (Republican)
*Mikki Lutes-Burton (Libertarian)
*Shawn Merrill (independent)
*Alice Novoa (Republican)
*William Pounds IV (Independent-Green)
*Liana West (Green)

General election

Lake was criticized for her denial of Joe Biden's victory in the 2020 presidential election. She had made her closeness to former president Donald Trump central to her campaign. Hobbs refused to debate Lake, which became a highly discussed issue of the campaign, earning criticism from Republicans. On October 16, 2022, Lake twice refused to say that she will accept the result if she does not win the election: "I'm going to win the election, and I will accept that result."

According to ''Politico'', the race was considered a toss-up. Lake called both the primaries and current round of elections "incompetent" and stated that "honest elections are needed" and that "the system we have right now does not work".

Debates and forums

Katie Hobbs refused to debate Kari Lake.

Predictions

Endorsements

Polling

;Aggregate polls

;Graphical summary

;Karrin Taylor Robson vs. Katie Hobbs

;Matt Salmon vs. Katie Hobbs

;Steve Gaynor vs. Katie Hobbs

;Generic Republican vs. generic Democrat

Results

Dispute over results

On November 17, Lake refused to concede defeat, and announced she was assembling a legal team to challenge the results. Lake alleged voter disfranchisement due to ballot printing problems and long waiting lines in Maricopa County, which had elections run by local Republican officials Bill Gates and Stephen Richer. In 70 out of 223 Maricopa County polling sites, voting machine ballots were printed too lightly to be read by tabulators; the problem was caused by a printer setting which had not shown widespread issues during prior testing. If voters did not want to wait in line for the issue to be fixed, they could leave to vote at another Maricopa County polling site, with wait times for polling sites being shown online, and many polling sites had little to no waiting lines, stated Maricopa County election officials. Alternatively, voters could drop their ballots into a secure box ("Box 3"), with these ballots being later tabulated at Maricopa County's elections headquarters, under monitoring from observers from both parties; ultimately, around 17,000 Maricopa County ballots were dropped into Box 3.

Bill Gates, the Republican chair of Maricopa's Board of Supervisors, partially blamed the long lines on Arizona Republican Party chairwoman Kelli Ward for discouraging voters from using Box 3; she had claimed that Box 3 should not be used as "Maricopa County is not turning on their tabulators downtown today". Lake herself told her supporters to stay in line to vote, while a lawyer for Lake's campaign assuaged concerns about using Box 3 to vote. Lake's campaign filed a lawsuit on Election Day to extend voting for another three hours, but Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Tim Ryan declined to do so, stating: "The court doesn't have any evidence that any voter was precluded from their right to vote".

While Lake alleged that Republican-dominated areas in Maricopa County were disproportionately affected by the printing problems, ''The Washington Post'' found that the percentage of registered Republicans in affected precincts (37%) was very close to the percentage of registered Republicans across Maricopa County (35%), and also found that some Democrat-dominated areas also faced the printing problems. According to the Associated Press: "Democrats voted overwhelmingly via ballots received in the mail. In-person Election Day votes heavily favored the GOP because Lake and other prominent Republicans had claimed it was more secure, which election experts dispute." Meanwhile, ''The New York Times'' analyzed 45 of the claims of irregularities reported by voters, finding that in 34 of these 45 claims, the voters were able to cast their vote despite an inconvenience; while for the others, three raised problems with voter registration; seven gave unclear accounts as to what exactly happened; and only one said she had been denied the opportunity to vote, though she acknowledged she had arrived at her polling place at the time it closed.

Arizona's Assistant Attorney General Jennifer Wright demanded that Maricopa County explain the election problems, stating: "These complaints go beyond pure speculation, but include first-hand witness accounts that raise concerns regarding Maricopa's lawful compliance with Arizona election law".

14 of Arizona's 15 counties certified the voting results by the November 28, 2022 deadline; the exception was Cochise County. Despite no evidence of irregularities with vote counting, Cochise County's Republican officials delayed their certification vote to December 2, 2022, to accommodate a hearing on the certification of voting machines. Previously on November 21, Arizona's State Elections Director, Kori Lorick, had sent County officials confirmation that the County's voting machines had been certified by the United States Election Assistance Commission in an accredited laboratory. However, the county's officials insisted on hearing more from those who had without evidence alleged that the voting machines were not properly certified.

On November 29, Hobbs, as Secretary of State, sued the County for being unable to certify results by the deadline.

On December 1, the Pima County Superior Court ruled that the Cochise County Board of Supervisors must hold an emergency meeting on the same day to certify and approve the canvass. Hours later, the Board voted 2-0 to do so.

Notes

;Partisan clients

References

External links

Official campaign websites

Katie Hobbs (D) for Governor

Kari Lake (R) for Governor

Mikaela Lutes-Burton (L) for Governor

William Pounds IV (IG) for Governor

Liana West (G) for Governor

{{2022 United States elections

2022
Arizona
Governor